grug and friends work many moon at frontierAI lab
every lunch grug and friends talk about frontierAI models
but this morning lab go public
grug and friends now own more rock than even in dreams
at lunch of fish (and leaves for grom) grug ask “what everyone do with rock pile?”
oog like simple life so oog work on pre-training
oog read old grug scroll so oog say “easy: sell rock pile, buy diversified index fund, take many walk in forest”
table go quiet
bork, group fast eater, choke on fish
“sell rock pile?”
oog nod
“for … coin?”
bork whisper “oog realize gain”
shudder around table but grug not understand why “realize” is bad word
grug ask what “realize gain” mean
bork explain if rock go from one coin to ten coin, tax man do nothing
if grug sell rock for ten coin, tax man appear
grug think strange system
bork say “bork no sell”
grug ask “then how bork buy big cave?”
“bork borrow coin”
“why bank give bork coin?”
“because bork have big frontierAI rock as collateral”
“but then you owe bank debt. grug know debt bad”
bork laugh “debt bad for poor grugs but good for rich ones”
grug ask “but what if frontierAI rock go down?”
bork say “frontierAI rock won’t go down”
bork look worried but bork work in mechanistic interpretability and they always worried
thog first finish his fish and then speak
“thog solve that problem too”
grug ask “how?”
“thog has too big frontierAI rock. but thog has lucky friend with too big nvidia rock, smart friend with too big apple rock, and strange friend with too big gold rock. we put all rock in big shared pile. now thog own little bit of every rock. call it exchange fund”
grug almost realize something but then grug stop himself “so thog diversify without sell?”
thog pull fish bone out of mouth and nod “thog has verifiable rewards”
thog is RLVR and pun specialist but grug still impressed with thog situational awareness. grug ask “but eventually thog must sell and pay tax?”
thog say “no. thog borrow until thog die”
grug say “but death bad”
thog say “for tax death actually quite good”
grug learn when thog die, little thog inherit rock with new basis
old gain disappear
grug curious now
“how dead thog need be?”
thog look at grug
“completely”
grug ask whether near-death count
thog say no
grug ask “what if grug fake death?”
“then grug commit tax fraud”
grug say tax code lack nuance
grom is group vegetarian (gross) and alignment safety researcher (grosser) and grom say “grom tax bill is also zero”
table go quiet again
bork ask “grom borrow?”
“no”
thog ask “use exchange fund?”
“no”
grug ask “then what?”
“grom give rock away”
whole table choke on fish
“to who?” grug ask
“for what?” bork bark
“why?!” thog yell
“for shrimp”
grug wait for joke
no joke come
thog and bork nod. now they understand
“so grom give rock for shrimp. grom no sell rock, so grom no realize gain”
grug still choking on fish
grom look confused
“grom just want help shrimp”
oog finish fish.
bork say again “oog realize gain”
bork say it like curse
but bork not sound certain
oog say “oog ignore shade. oog enjoy sun”
oog go for walk in forest
whole table watch oog go
grug go back to desk
grug supposed to make model better at write kubernetes config
grug instead think about rock. grug think about rock rest of day
next lunch nobody talk about model